Nothing Lasts Forever
by Siartha
Summary: AoU spoilers and major canon changes. Baron von Strucker lives, and he has several nasty surprises up his sleeve. Ultron is gathering might, and the Avengers are struggling to become a unit. Soon, three great forces will clash. Only one victor can emerge, but will it really matter in light of what's to come? OC/Pietro, Clintasha, Wanda/Vision and more Marvel characters.
1. Ghost in the Ruins

**Chapter 1: Ghost in the Ruins**

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 **AN: Hi guys! I'd appreciate if you'd give this story a go even if it's kind of weird. Alternate version of AoU where von Strucker is alive, Clint has no family, and Ultron's extinction plan involves no meteors. It picks up after the movie's final battle in Sokovia, and there are some major changes to canon and several OCs. Story may be told in non-linear fashion at times. Hopefully (*crosses fingers*) this will extend into Infinity Wars. [Edited July 14, 2015]**

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The dust was still settling over Sokovia when von Strucker sent his necromancer into the battlefield to retrieve the bodies and see who was worth saving.

She was another one of his experiments, another one of his "miracles." Although only the Maximoffs had been recorded as successes, the Baron actually had three more aces up his sleeve, so to speak. Originally written off as failures, von Strucker was forced to reconsider when the twins turned traitors. While it was true that Wanda and Pietro had been his crowning achievement, but it would be a lie to say that the Baron's other monsters were not formidable opponents, defective as they were. No matter now, with the combined power of his three remaining creations, the Baron would have a _very_ firm grip on Quicksilver, and Scarlet Witch would soon follow her brother.

Broken figures lay amidst the rubble, some alive and bleeding from horrific injuries, some staring skywards with glassy eyes and no visible wounds. Eveline drifted through the now empty city like a ghost. Baron von Strucker could by no measure be described as a kind man, so the countless bodies of women and children from Ultron's wrath did not faze Eveline even as their terrified expressions remained, begging her for some sort of mercy that death did not give. She cared not for them, as she could do nothing to help.

Her powers could only save one, and the lucky receiver had already been chosen by the Baron. He was a fallen soldier, a playing piece of the enemy, able to move faster than the wind itself.

No wind could escape Ultron's metal monsters, Eveline discovered as she happened upon the unmoving form of Pietro Maximoff, one of the Avenger's newest warriors. His torso was riddled with bullets and some had clipped the legs that should have carried him to safety. Circular prints of red surrounded each wound, slowly growing in diameter like blooming flowers.

Though blood was still spreading through Pietro's shirt when Eveline arrived, the man once known as Quicksilver was dead. A thin film of white ash covered him, and he lay on the concrete where he had fallen, face-down, limbs awkwardly splayed.

While in the Baron's compound, Eveline had glimpsed the twins only once, but she would recognize their striking features anywhere. She looked down at the man before her.

 _Adidas, check. Bad blond dye job, check_. Eveline's mouth twisted into a smirk. Perhaps the hair was a result of von Strucker's experimentation or maybe this superhero just had a very strange sense of fashion.

"Master?" Eveline called out, knowing that he would hear.

"Yes, he is the one," confirmed a murmur in the breeze, carrying the accented voice of von Strucker.

Eveline kneeled down next to Pietro and carefully turned him over so that he looked up. His head lolled to the side and peroxide locks fell over his closed eyes but there was no life in his hands to brush the hair out of the way.

Blood soaked through the lightweight grey material of Pietro's shirt leading Eveline to slice it off with a pocket knife, revealing the injuries that had ripped away the newest of the Avengers.

"You're liberated in death," Eveline whispered under her breath, so the Baron would not hear. "But who will avenge you?" Her slim fingers fluttered over Quicksilver's chest and the bullet holes that marred it. Dark tendrils of her magic danced around her hands but she didn't act just yet.

"Do it," hissed the wind in her ear.

Eveline closed her eyes and took a deep breath, summoning the power she had so carefully collected within her. Focussing it in her hands, she whispered a purpose to the black smoke that gathered in her fingertips. The magic understood and it emerged, slowly at first, then faster as it gained strength and momentum.

Her fingers danced over and around Pietro's wounds as inky spectral threads wove through his body. Eveline let the magic do its work, healing in ways doctors never could. Bullets were pushed out, falling to the hard ground with metallic _clink_ s. Muscle knitted back together followed the skin over it. Quicksilver's blood stained the pale skin of both parties, but for Eveline it was only on her hands and legs, where she was kneeling in it. She paid no heed to how the white fabric of her jeans drank in the red like water as she was too immersed in her task. A few splatters of blood somehow found their way onto Eveline's face, making a mockery of the dead.

A small smile found its way to her lips as she worked on her carefully crafted masterpiece. It looked fairly simple but there was a skill to bringing back the dead that had taken Eveline several horrifying mistrials to master.

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The first bodies she had reanimated were nothing more than shambling corpses without soul. Their limbs moved, but their eyes were empty. They spoke, but there was no meaning to the words and no purpose to their stolen life. They understood, they were loyal, and they obeyed only the one who brought them back. The Baron had been pleased with his small group of mindlessly loyal soldiers, for as long as Eveline obeyed von Strucker, so would they.

When one of his better experiments had failed, the Baron sent for Eveline to revive it.

The body was fresh, lifeless no longer than a few minutes. A slight tinge of pink remained in the dead girl's cheeks and her skin was still warm to the touch. Eveline recognized the flaming hair to belong to Serafina, a pyromancer she'd only glimpsed and heard whispers of. By all rights, she should have still been alive and Eveline could not find a cause of death. It was the first time the sorceress let her mind delve deeper than the surface wounds to uncover a whole other world beyond this one.

Hel, as Eveline knew it, was nigh indescribable, but if she had to compare it to something it would be the endless universe. It was darkness, but not quite, for the black had a sort of luminescence that could never have existed elsewhere. Pinpricks of multi-coloured light surrounded her like ethereal smoke. Sometimes she caught a glimpse of a face but then it would shift to become nothing more than insubstantial aether. A golden palace glimmered in the distance, but it was always beyond Eveline's reach even as her power and range increased.

In Serafina's case, her soul was only inches away from where Eveline's projected consciousness had appeared. It burned with gold and red just as it had in life, and Eveline reached out for it. It held a pleasant heat and felt like nothing on Earth. Despite the horrors of the day, Eveline couldn't help but smile at the wild beauty of what the afterlife appeared to be.

A dull ache began to throb in Eveline's mind, reminding her of the job she was sent to perform. Carefully holding Serafina's spirit, Eveline turned to find her way back to her world. It was not as simple as opening her eyes, she soon discovered.

It was a winding road, dark and full of whispering shadows, yet not physical for it existed only in the mind. Serafina's soul pulsed and fought to escape the path between worlds, but Eveline only gripped it tighter.

After what seemed like hours, Eveline's eyes snapped back open. It was intangible, but she knew she held Serafina somewhere within the recesses of her mind. Unable to find another method, Eveline pressed her lips to the dead girl's and breathed true life into it. The action seemed to steal something from Eveline herself, and the necromancer passed out next to newly revived Serafina.

She awoke to a stinging slap across her cheek.

"What did you do?" hissed Dr. Bauer, one of the scientists that had worked on Eveline.

"I don't know," she shrieked, scrambling back to avoid punishment.

"The girl is mad! You brought back a monster," shouted Bauer, spittle flying from his lips as he gestured angrily to the adjacent room.

Eveline registered she was sitting on the cold concrete of the hallway outside the cells. An inferno raged in the last room, and inhuman shrieks of pain and fury echoed throughout the whole facility. Armored soldiers rushed past her with fire extinguishers and guns, the former used to put out the flames, the latter used to extinguish the source.

Serafina had not come willingly, Eveline realized. The soul had _wished_ for death and Eveline had ripped it away from blissful nothingness.

Eveline had not brought back the monster. No, _she_ was the monster.

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A final pass over the man's heart and Eveline sent a jolt of her dark magic to restart it. A soft press of her hand to his chest – now unmarred by anything but blood without source – let her feel the steady beating of the organ beneath. His body was back.

Now for the tricky part.

Sweat had already gathered at Eveline's brow and now it trickled freely down her face as she searched for Pietro's soul in the space beyond this world. He had not been dead long so he could not have travelled far into the endless eternity where the lost resided.

Eveline found Quicksilver's consciousness easily for it was a beautiful silver and it moved as fast and sharp as his name would suggest. The sorceress called to it sweetly in a tongue that man no longer spoke. The Baron had taught her the phrase after much research into old mythology, and in the past Eveline had proven the incantation to work. The words left her mouth and were twisted into a song of sunshine and water and all the other beauties that Earth held. She made no mention of the Hell she lived in.

The silver-bright spirit followed the song willingly and Eveline had to gently push away the other souls that were drawn by the voice of one who was unlike them. Quicksilver's mind paused for a moment before Eveline grasped it and pulled it back to the realm of the living.

The way between the worlds was painful to traverse and Eveline was barely able to hold onto consciousness as her eyes snapped back open and she breathed Pietro's soul back into his body.

The ruined city spun and shifted in and out of focus. The ground grew as Eveline toppled over sideways. The last thing she saw was the rise and fall of Quicksilver's chest as he breathed once again.

" _You did well, meine kleine Fürstin,_ " came her Master's whisper.

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 **AN: Please review! :)**

 **meine kleine Fürstin - my little princess**


	2. Danse Macabre

**Chapter 2: Danse Macabre**

 **AN: Important! In my version of the this battle, Ultron is simply testing the strength of a robot army against the Avengers. The meteorite will not happen, and no part of Sokovia is floating. It's simply a fight that Ultron orchestrated by attacking Sokovian civilians, knowing that the Avengers would come to the rescue.**

 **Other than that, I hope you like the direction this is going. Thanks to all who followed, added to favourites, and reviewed!**

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He saw what would happen before it did, but this time his talent brought nothing but heartache. A head of tousled hair peeked out from over Hawkeye's shoulder and a small arm was wrapped around the archer's neck. The Maximoffs were many things, but heartless was never one of them. Pietro made his decision as fast as he could run.

Barton had a job, friends, something grand to live for. Pietro only had Wanda. He would be loathe to leave her alone in the world but the speedster knew that his sister was far stronger than she realized. Somehow, she would make it.

Bullets rained down like hail, bringing with them a blinding cloud of dust. For a second, the gunfire was deafening and in the next Pietro heard nothing but the blood rushing in his ears.

He stood in shock, arms outstretched towards a disbelieving Barton and the child they had both protected. As always, Pietro could watch in slow motion as confusion knitted Hawkeye's brow then was quickly replaced with a mixture of great sorrow and gratitude as understanding dawned.

"You didn't see that coming," Pietro said with the last breath of air in his lungs. A small smirk crossed his face.

The world, forever so slow, suddenly sped up. The buildings around him blurred as life and power escaped his body. His collapse was not slow, it was not fast – it was human. In his last moment, he was no longer Quicksilver but simply Pietro Maximoff, the boy who would have given anything to protect his sister and country.

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Wanda Maximoff was one half of a whole and she felt something shatter within her when Pietro fell. The very fabric of her being rent in two and something irreplaceable within her died. An inhuman scream of unimaginable pain tore from her lips as her brother was ripped from her.

Agony, rage, fear. That trio found their way into Wanda and were released through a powerful blast of scarlet magic. Robots shattered into a thousand pieces, scrap metal flying everywhere. A piece sliced across Wanda's cheek but it felt like a gentle caress compared the torture that she was suffering.

Her brother, her protector, her best friend, her twin. Wanda could feel a gaping wound within her where Pietro's mind had always pressed against her own like a perfectly matching puzzle piece. A void where once had been her one solace in the hard years they'd passed together. Wanda recoiled from her own powers, gathering the red strands of her magic away from the hole in her mind.

This was one wound that time could never hope to heal.

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Pausing to put down the boy he carried, Clint rushed over to Pietro's body, praying to find a pulse or heartbeat.

There was silence, interrupted solely by the noise of crunching gravel as Steve Rogers ran over.

Clint glanced up at the other Avenger, and a single look of futility was shared. The Maximoff boy had died for Barton, and there was nothing the archer could do but close Pietro's staring blue eyes, glassed over with death.

The sharp whine of the Quinjet's engine jerked Steve's attention away from the scene before him. He looked skywards to see the familiar outline of the plane speeding closer.

"Run!" shouted Steve. He picked up the boy Barton had ran to save before turning to escape. He glanced over his shoulder as he ran only to see the archer pause and reach down to carry along the body of Pietro Maximoff. "There's no time!"

Clint looked at Steve with consuming guilt in his eyes and remorse on his face. "I–"

Captain Rogers cut off Barton's sentence. "Now, or we'll all be dead!" Urgency lent his voice fury as the jet flew ever nearer.

There was reluctance in Barton's movements as he abandoned Pietro for the safety of the ships but it didn't slow him down. He was a professional after all, and hesitation often spelled death.

They made it to cover as bullets fell where they had been just seconds previous. Barton looked out in time to see a scarlet mist surround the Quinjet and send it crashing into a building. Wanda stood a few metres away from the boats, glaring murderously towards the destroyed aircraft that held Ultron's primary body. She wove the threads of magic around her fingers, preparing for battle as a seemingly endless horde of robots swarmed over the ruins of Sokovia's capital.

"Get in the ship!"

The whirring of the engine increased in volume and Barton didn't know if Wanda had heard Steve's message.

For the second time that day, Clint abandoned the safety of the carrier crafts to retrieve someone. He ran to the younger Maximoff twin and grabbed her arm. "Wanda, let's go!"

Her eyes were red and filled with cold rage when she turned to look at him. "I am already dead," she said, shaking off his hand.

"Wanda, list–" Clint was cut off again, this time by a bolt of Scarlet Witch's magic. He went flying backwards and through the open door of the carrier.

The boat began to lift off from the ground, propellors and jets roaring madly. Clint heard nothing but Pietro's last words as he watched Wanda obliterate the first wave of robots.

 _You didn't see that coming, you didn't see that coming, you didn'tseethatcoming_. The words increased in volume and speed the further away from Wanda the boat rose.

Possessed by some wild form of guilty mania, Clint prepared to jump off the ship and do anything to save the one Maximoff twin he could.

However, before Clint could act, a blur of red and green crossed the battle scene and carried Wanda away.

Vision. Stark's creation against Stark's creation... Clint didn't like the idea of it much, but he had to admit that the android had proved its worth several times over.

Clint backed away from the still open door of the boat, stumbling to find a seat. Fatigue washed over him as the full weight of the day's activities sunk in. Most of Ultron's robots had been easy to destroy and none were capable of flight, but the sheer number of them was staggering. There was nothing they could do right now, but Ultron would have to be stopped as soon as possible, before he created enough robots to overwhelm an army. If that happened it would be war on a global scale and Clint wasn't sure that humans would win.

* * *

Darkness.

No, not darkness. Pietro realized he _could_ see, it was just that there was absolutely nothing there. A funny sort of sourceless grey light was present, but there was nothing to illuminate. There were no shadows and no highlights yet an impression of vast stretches of empty land was created.

"Hello?" he called out, but the void stole his voice as quickly as it sounded, leaving a hollow silence.

He had no body and there was no indication that he even existed. Nothing but the reality that resided within his own brain. Pietro knew he was dead and so, logically, whatever this strange place was, was the afterlife.

Creations of the mind had always been Wanda's field, but the absence of sense and form evoked strange imaginings for Pietro. Dark shapes shifted around him, neither near or far for there really was no distance. Sometimes he thought he saw eyes, glinting with red and gold. But what was color? He could hardly remember. Red... Scarlet... The color of his sister.

Sister? Wanda. She was the one memory he held onto even when he thought he had lost himself.

How long had it been? Time stretched into eternity and lost all meaning. What was a second? The time it took to blink? What was blinking? Though he saw, Pietro no longer had eyes.

The void tore at his sanity. Memories drifted away, words, thoughts, everything that made him human. The speed that had served him so well in life was useless in death. Even if he had his legs, there was no where to flee, and the only thing to run from would be himself.

Pietro stood at the brink of his mind, some unspeakable horror looming both behind and ahead. He was ready to fall again, this time into bottomless despair and insanity.

Perhaps it took minutes, perhaps decades, but slowly, something started to change. It came peacefully, the return of his senses. Pietro became tangible again, going from invisible to translucent to fully opaque. He was wearing what the clothes he died in, still stained with his own blood. He could feel the cold metal of the bullets inside his body but there was no pain.

Surroundings formed around him. A dark forest with a single straight path leading to a golden castle. Behind him, a choking mist crept forwards, skeletal hands reaching out.

Pietro did the one thing that never failed him. He ran.

A silver blur trailed him, marking his path down the compact dirt road. He ran until his lungs burned and his muscles screamed for air. The palace was no closer to him than before. In fact, it seemed farther away than ever.

The mist stole ever closer.

Something cold brushed Pietro's hand. He looked down in horror to see the bones of a child's small fingers reached out to grasp his own.

"Dance with me!" The voice was high pitched and eager, completely at odds with the rotting skull that spoke.

" _Dance with us_ ," echoed a whispering chorus. The mist receded to reveal an endless sea of the dead. Some would not seem dead at all if not for their bloodless skin and fever-bright eyes. Others were horribly disfigured by their cause of death.

They came from all walks of life. Men in bathrobes, women in evening gowns, children in pajamas, all hand in hand, dancing in a circle.

The skeletal child pulled Pietro into the circle with inhuman strength. "Dance with me!" He insisted brightly.

There was no music and yet the dancers all moved in synchronization. Then a melody started. The high, haunting voice of a woman. She sang in a language Pietro had never heard before but the words were soft and expressive. Pietro saw sunlight over a gentle ocean. He saw a fawn in green forest, wind over a field of red flowers, icy mountain peaks with their wild beauty. He saw life.

Those closest to Pietro must have also experienced the visions for they broke from the circle and staggered towards the lilting voice. Desperate hunger twisted their faces. A desire so strong they felt an ache in hearts that had been still for centuries.

A point of light appeared, not too far from Pietro. Some corpses close to it tried to embrace the light but were gently rebuffed. Pietro ran for the light and in less than a second he had reached it. He grabbed the tiny pinprick and was suddenly wrenched into a twisting labyrinth.

A hand was in his, but this time it was warm and solid, belonging to a woman who would not turn to look at him. He followed her up cracked stone stairwells and through the hellish maze. Her dress billowed out behind, sometimes brushing against Pietro's legs. Their pace was fast for most, but to him, it was painfully slow.

For a crazy moment Pietro thought she might be Wanda but that thought was dismissed as quickly as it came. No, this woman seemed leached of color with hair that was almost white and skin so pale it was nearly translucent. Pietro knew the fit of Wanda's hand in his own and this was not it.

Pietro paused, pulling back. What if he was in Hell and this was some cruel trick, designed to give him false hope before plunging him deeper into eternal torment?

"Well come on then, Eurydice." The woman didn't turn but Pietro could hear the smirk in voice.

 _Eurydice?_ Had she mistaken him for someone else? Pietro had no time to ponder this new development because the woman had yanked him around a corner to stand at the edge of a precipice.

Pietro's fast reflexes let him come to a stop before he fell in. He stood by her side but hair veiled her face. He felt her hand on his back, trying to push him into the dark water several feet below, but she wasn't strong enough.

"Jump," she said.

"Why?" asked Pietro. His voice was hoarse from disuse and the sound of it was unfamiliar.

She merely pointed downwards. The water shimmered and a faint image appeared. Pietro watched the scene unfold like a movie in front of him.

Wanda stood alone in the ruins of the Sokovian capital. Red magic glowed at her hands and in her eyes but despite her immense power Pietro knew she could not hope to defeat the massive army of robots gathering before her.

Without a second thought, Pietro dove into the murky depths.

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 **AN: If you don't know who Eurydice is, I'm referring to the story of Orpheus and Eurydice from Greek mythology. Basically, Eurydice is Orpheus' wife and she dies from a snakebite. Orpheus, who is a talented musician with the most beautiful voice, loves her so much that he goes to the underworld to bargain for her life. His singing moves Hades so much that the lord of the underworld allows Orpheus to bring Eurydice back as long as he doesn't turn to look if she's following him until they reach the world of the living. They're almost there when Orpheus, unsure of whether Eurydice is behind him, turns to look. As it happens, Eurydice was actually there all along but now Orpheus has lost her forever. Completely heartbroken Orpheus wanders around playing sad music until he's eventually ripped to pieces by wild nymphs. What a life.**

 **Anyways, I've borrowed elements of that story, but in no way should it be viewed as foreshadowing.**  
 **Please review and tell me what you like and dislike. Also if you pick up on any grammar/spelling/plot mistakes, please tell me! :)**


	3. Thaumaturgy

**Chapter 3: Thaumaturgy**

 **AN: First and foremost, thank you all for the follows and favourites, I appreciate each one!**

 **I realize that my writing is boring but I promise it will get better after this chapter! Next chapter will have more dialogue, be longer, and hopefully I don't screw that up too badly.**  
 **I haven't watched Agents of Shield, so anything that's happened there is not canon, just thought I'd throw that out there just in case :P**  
 **Anyways, I apologize for delay and I hope you enjoy!**

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It would be a lie to say Wolfgang von Strucker did not love his experiments. After all the effort he put into creating them, it would be an absolute waste not to feel anything but a strong sense of paternal pride.

The Baron barely saw them as people anymore. They were works of art, shaped by his own hand into the masterpieces they were now. The twins had been his magnum opus and his loss of them had been devastating. But the world was an ocean, and tides can change. Quicksilver had been washed back, and with a little... _conditioning_ , von Strucker could perfect his greatest creations.

A slender hand reached up to slide across his shoulder. Warm breath tickled his ear as a dulcet voice spoke in lightly accented tones. "Is it my turn yet?"

Strucker nodded. "Go on, _Schmetterling_."

He watched her leave, admiring the swing of her hips as she traversed the wreckage of a once proud Sokovian city. Her bright clothing and immaculately styled hair made stark contrast with ruins around her, like a butterfly in a battlefield.

Solange Delacroix.

When one was German nobility, one was obligated to attend certain events. An ice skating show was among the stranger social functions von Strucker had experienced, but it turned out to be quite worth it.

Her stunning Eurasian features and the way she danced on ice with a languid grace that could never be learned or imitated had drawn his attention. It wasn't often a someone could catch his eye like that, and it had been months since he'd had a woman.

She had been a professional figure skater when the Baron found her in Paris. Now, she was something better.

A prototype for Scarlet Witch, that's what all the women had been, really. There was similarity between all of them, yet each individual reacted differently when exposed to the scepter.

At first, Eveline seemed to have not reacted at all, her powers dormant even with injection after injection. They pushed her using all sorts of stimuli. Gently at first, then harsher when there was no response. Finally, something made her snap – von Strucker still wasn't sure what – for he never bothered to find out. The result was all that mattered. His little Romanian had somehow managed to kill a guard without ever laying a finger on him, and in the following commotion, revived his body. After several trials, she was a classified as a glass cannon with a slow recharge. Her powers were limited if she needed to save up to perform a resurrection, but useful on occasion, especially one such as this. She was able to perform other small tricks – draining life from plants to add to her own reserve – but none useful to the Baron.

Solange was a another matter entirely. Beautiful even before the Baron's meddling, the scepter's magic turned the young woman into an irresistible siren. Men fell before her like flies to honey, and like the flies, they drowned in while still in a stupor of happiness. Her words were music. She would speak in sultry tones with the barest hint of French, an elegant hand tracing warm patterns on their skin, and the listener would feel a compelling urge to do whatever she asked, no matter the consequences. The effects lasted only a few hours, but repeated contact made slaves of her lovers. A kiss could rob men of all reason, and just like that, the Baron had created the thing he would come to dread.

Pietro woke up slowly. His body ached like he had fallen from a great height. Had he? His mind was still sluggish and he couldn't recall much of what had happened up to this moment. He remembered fighting robots and leaving Wanda alone to defend the church. Was the battle over? Who had won?

Countless heaps of metal littered the city but when he looked closer Pietro could also see the fallen bodies of many Sokovian citizens. Not two steps away from him was the motionless form of a girl in street clothing, face down in the dust. Her fingers were bloodstained and her hand rested on grey cloth.

 _Was that his shirt?_ Pietro looked down to see his bare, bloodied torso. _What on Earth?_ He didn't have too long to ponder this new development as he was distracted by the unmistakable crunch of shoes on gravel.

Nothing around him moved so it was easy to spot the figure walking towards him. A little apprehensive but wildly curious, Quicksilver ran to it.

A woman, wearing a dark skintight dress with vibrant orange and white patterning. She didn't look fazed as Pietro appeared in a flash of silver. "My, my, you're in a rush." Full red lips pulled up into a smirk.

There was a time when Pietro might have been entranced by the beauty before him, and even now, he wanted to feel the smoothness of her skin beneath his hands, the suppleness of her body as her back arched with pleasure, the warmth between her legs. "Have you seen my sister?" He blurted out instead.

"Sister?" The woman pouted, her hand coming to rest on Pietro's bicep. "Why think about her when you can think about me?"

A moment of terror flashed through his mind but it was too late – the spell had been cast. The woman smiled up at Pietro, eyes twinkling with merriment.

He smiled back, Wanda forgotten. "Oh, I'm definitely thinking about you."

"The name's Solange." All Pietro saw was the cling of the dress to her curves, the gold of her skin. In some back part of his mind a warning signal flashed, screaming "Danger! Find your sister! Danger!" but Solange's magic settled over him like a blanket, muffling the alarm bells.

Pietro had been rescued from the valley of the dead only to become lost in the world of the living.

* * *

Wanda felt Pietro take the first breath of his new life. She felt half of her soul flutter back and settle gently on the wound created when her twin died, melding back so smoothly that it seemed there had never been one in the first place. A deep and instantaneous joy filled her before her brain had time to catch up.

Was she going mad?

She then decided she didn't care. Insanity was better than having to experience the hole in her mind that Pietro had once filled.

Her magic never lied to her before, but Wanda supposed it was possible that she had hit some sort of breaking point. She had heard of phantom limbs before. Now she had a phantom brother.

Tentatively, like it was the first time she had done so, Wanda reached out for her twin's thoughts. It was hard, considering the distance between them, but the link between their minds was a well-worn track and once she found it, it was easy to fall back into the familiar path.

Pietro was a jumbled mess when his sister found him, but even in the disarray of his thoughts, one thing in particular stood out: WANDA.

A floodgate broke within her, and for the first time since the battle Sokovia, the Scarlet Witch broke down and cried. She wasn't quite sure what for, but sometime in between the great heaving sobs that wracked her body, she felt something change.

A thin film of some shimmering dust had settled over Pietro's mind like autumn leaves over forest floor. Watching his thoughts was like peering through a gauze curtain, and Wanda could only see the vaguest of ideas floating around like lost kites.

She wanted to scream, to rage, to storm off to wherever Pietro was and demand answers. Was it even real? It didn't seem fair that she had just got him back and now he was gone again. She felt her magic brewing dangerously within her like a storm waiting to be unleashed, and unleash it she did.

The blast reduced two rooms to chalky rubble and blew out most of the floor-to-ceiling windows on the 54th floor of Stark's tower.

All she could hear was the tinkling of glass as it settled, ignoring the surprised shouts that came from the other people in the building. How could the world be so cruel? To take Pietro away then teasing her with the smallest sliver of hope before destroying that as well.

Vision was the first to find her. He stood there for a moment, silent, head tilted slightly to the side, observing her with a bright blue stare.

"Wanda."

She turned at the sound of her name. Her dark eyes met his mechanical ones. "Vision." She blinked, letting a glistening tear rolled down her cheek. She hastily scrubbed it away with the back of her hand. "Tell Tony I'm sorry about this," she said quickly, gesturing to the shattered windows and chunks of metal that littered the surroundings. She turned away from him, making to leave.

"I will." The android drifted over the debris, closer to the Maximoff girl, and reached out a hand. "For what it's worth from me, I'm sorry."

Wanda turned her head to offer him a shaky half-smile. "Thank you," she whispered before walking out.

Vision let his hand fall back to his side as a rush of foreign emotion entered his mind. Sorrow, sympathy, sadness. All beginning with an _s_ , just like _sorry_. He mouthed the word again. Pre-existing data had told him that humans offered an apology in times of grief. Somehow, it just didn't seem adequate. The girl had lost half of herself and all he had was one word.

 _Sorry._

* * *

 **AN: My goal is for the Baron to have German nicknames for all his "miracles," because he's a creepy weirdo.**

 **I don't know how to write for Vision, can you tell? XD**

 **PLEASE REVIEW, I'LL LOVE YOU FOREVER IF YOU DO. (And please tell me if this chapter uploaded properly, I'm on a boat and the internet's kind of wonky.)**

 **Schmetterling - butterfly**


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